MATS, LOUISVILLE -- While encouraging audience members to file their comments on recently proposed legislation for mandatory electronic logs and the agency's research into new-entrant requirements, Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administrator Anne Ferro last week also noted that the agency is going ahead with a pilot study of split sleep.

The clock has started for comments on the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s proposed electronic log mandate. The proposal will be published in the Federal Register Friday March 28, starting a two-month period when the agency will accept comments.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration’s proposed electronic log mandate, unveiled Thursday, takes on a broad range of issues that have dogged the 15-year effort to draft a rule. HDT's Oliver Patton reports on what's in the 256-page proposal that would require drivers who fill out paper logs to eventually switch to electronic logging devices, or ELDs.

The Department of Transportation is worried that states will start slowing their highway and transit programs even before this summer when the Highway Trust Fund is slated to start running out of money.

Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration regional offices have once again extended emergency declarations waiving certain federal regulations for those involved in the interstate hauling of emergency relief supplies as cold weather continues in the Midwest and Northeast.

Following a Jan. 27 crash killing an Illinois Tollway worker and seriously injuring an Illinois State Police trooper, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has declared Illinois-licensed truck driver Renato V. Velasquez to be an imminent hazard to public safety and ordered him not to operate any commercial motor vehicle in interstate commerce.

A field test of the 34-hour restart provision of the new hours of service rule shows that the restrictions improve safety. The test found that the provision, which requires drivers to take two successive periods off between 1 a.m. and 5 a.m. during their once-a-week restart, is more effective at combating fatigue than the earlier rule, said the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration has expanded emergency declarations it issued earlier this month, waiving enforcement of some federal regulations for certain movements of propane and other home heating fuels due to shortages

In a letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx, the National Propane Gas Association on Wednesday called on him to grant regional exemptions from federal hours of service regulations for the Midwest and Eastern parts of the U.S., to relieve what the group says is "pressure on the current propane distribution network."

UPDATED, Jan. 9, 2013, 9:45 a.m., EST Extraordinarily cold weather in part of the U.S. has resulted in more states issuing emergency declarations, waiving mainly hours of service rules, when it comes to hauling various fuels.

New Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration hours-of-service regulations for truckers could mean increased costs for consumers, according to a new study from the University of Tennessee’s Global Supply Chain Institute.

The American Transportation Research Institute on Monday released the findings of its latest analysis of the operational and economic impacts resulting from the new hours-of-service rules that went into effect July 1.

ORLANDO -- The changes to the federal commercial driver hours of service rules that went into effect July 1 caused the issue to top the American Transportation Research Institute's annual survey of more than 4,000 trucking industry executives, truck drivers, trucking industry suppliers and government.